Broadcast is using computer voice not the actual voice

[g00glefanboy247]

the broadcast message is back to using computer voice, not the actual human voice. this was fixed last year, now it's back to that lame computer voice that messed up the actual voice message. hope something can be done asap. i am using google home 1st gen and google home mini 1st gen.

[realjax]

Cant believe they ffed this up again!!

[g00glefanboy247]

i don't know why they keep messing up a function that is working. Are they really trying to annoy their consumers?

[MplsCustomer]

Why in the world does Google Nest think this is what customers want?????

This happened last October, until they got so much flack they fixed it a couple of months later:

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Speakers-and-Displays/Broadcasting-has-changed-not-our-own-vo...

https://support.google.com/assistant/thread/239279352/why-broadcasts-are-no-longer-using-my-voice-in...

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Speakers-and-Displays/Spoken-broadcast-message-changed-to-spo...

[g00glefanboy247]

guess their people are just too lazy to test before deploying updates. this shouldn't be happening already. what they should fix is making it more responsive and maybe, if possible, integrate their Gemini just what they did to Android phones.

[Agent-616]

Agree with all above. Why the heck are you messing around with this Google? It worked perfectly fine, if a lil slow sometimes. But geez, stop changing it already. 

Let's hope the fix doesn't take months again. 

[BjörnIse]

I almost had a heart attack when I heard that AI broadcast voice again this morning. I've about had it with Google. Constantly introducing either bugs or things nobody wants. At least have the decency to notify us of changes and offer the option to opt-out of those changes.

[g00glefanboy247]

They also now have the option to select what devices are allowed to broadcast. They just keep changing the software. It's ok but I do hope they don't mess up working ones already.

[Kaissandei]

Came to report the same thing. It was fixed last year but now it's back. The broadcast is broken as far as I'm concerned. It takes forever to come through and missing half the message. 

[Chromedome2431]

Glad I'm not the only one experiencing this. The delay is a pain in the a$$. So tired of everything with a Google name on it having constant issues. 

[bch]

I beginning to think the devs being hired are completely underqualified.  Never have I seen so much incompetence than we see with google home products.   Started off great, but boy, google sure likes to pick things apart so they are completely unusable....then say "there isn't enough usage so we are canning the whole project".   Crazy.

[g00glefanboy247]

i agree. the goal is to improve and not break something that is already working.

[realjax]

Just remember people that Google is evil. They probably needed more input data for AI training purposes. So they just steal our voices for a few months and then say 'oh sorry, we are doing our utmost to fix this asap!'. Mark my words 

[OSTBear]

I know this had been an issue last year around October... But it appears to be back again. 

When I tell Google to broadcast a message, it translates it through speech to text. This is absolutely infuriating for me because I work with a young man with Down syndrome who doesn't trust the robot voice. He trusts the voices of people he recognizes.

This feature was so wildly unpopular before, I can't picture why it would suddenly come back. I read months and months of messages from people complaining about this. Do you all just not care about our concerns anymore?

[MplsCustomer]

@OSTBear 

These two posts recent are reporting the same issue:

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Speakers-and-Displays/Here-we-go-again-no-more-voice-broadcas...

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Speakers-and-Displays/Broadcast-is-using-computer-voice-not-t...

[JillG]

Hi @OSTBear 

Thanks for reporting this and we have the Nest team looking into it now. 

[realjax]

And ask them how come they ff-ed this up again!

[g00glefanboy247]

thanks. hope they can fix sooner than later.

[g00glefanboy247]

hi, @JillG . just to update the function is working but sometimes it will still use the assistant voice. it only happened a few times in a day. hope you can relay this to your team for further checking. thank you for your assistance. hope to hear from you soon.

[Madshifter]

So the AI transcribed messages are back when broadcasting. It's no longer broadcasting my messages as is anymore... AGAIN. 

Is anyone else experiencing this? 

[Arioni]

Yes, it's broken again, same here, tried the same steps as the last time, issue persists, they deployed something that broke it again... Unfortunately we wont be able to use the feature until they fix it, no workarounds, if it keeps happening, I'm sure a lot of people will migrate to a more reliable option. They killed the option of internal calling the home devices saying that the broadcast would suffice, now they screwed up the only option they left available. Good job.

[Madshifter]

@Muddi kindly advise what is going on and when it will be resolved. I just added new preducts to the lineup of nests and am regretting it already. 

[dchurch315]

Would anyone from the Nest team like to weigh in? Running every broadcast through speech-to-text has to be eating up a lot of computing power that could be used for some AI training or another product. I know this has happened at last twice before but it would be nice if their was some official statement and/or a timeline to fix.

[realjax]

Its pathetic.  I guess google has significantly lowered job requirements when hiring programmers since they seem to have no clue.

[Dallysparkles]

i hate it it is Aweful... what are they even thinking? Why are they fixing something that isn't broken?... i'm going to bet there is some plan in the works to start charging us for extra services and one of the extra services is now going to be the option to turn this rubbish off...

[Dallysparkles]

So it wasn't broken and now they are trying to fix it.. it's not usable.. the speakers ping... then there is a 10 second delay then finally AI speaks but it's only half a message and we have no idea who it is from. Google just put it back the way it was. please just relay the message as it's recorded and as spoken by the person.. what are you even trying to do?.. if it persists i'm going to have to turn the whole system off. so far all i use google for is to ask it what time it is, what the weather is and mainly for Broadcasting messages over the nest of googles to tell kids to go to bed or come and get their dinner.

[beeagee]

This is AWFUL.  Does it have to do with the "changes" (aka removed features) on account of the recent layoffs?  Or these changes to Google Assistant which involve using your own voice:  https://support.google.com/assistant/answer/13971691?hl=en&sjid=8386472822659379084-AP????

[bch]

Yep, noticed this yesterday.  Again!   Man, this is frustrating.   It's worse this time.   Try to broadcast....you hear a ding....then 5 to 10 seconds later a horrible attempt by the assistant voice to broadcast your message in her voice.  

Google:  Is this something that you are doing on purpose?  Can you be honest?  Yes or no?????

[Enzo_]

This "feature" is really annoying.

The broadcast is the feature we use the most in our house. We invested here so we can have an easy way to communicate across three different levels and multiple rooms. Now, it's completely broken... AGAIN! 

The issues are:

1) Even each speaker is labeled in a different room, I can't broadcast to an specific room as I did before. E.g.: "ok Google. Broadcast to living room". 

2) The messages, as  mentioned above, has returned to be AI voice. This is useless and has no value for the end-user. I prefer to use hear any family member voice over the emotionless AI voice. 

I wonder how can we fight this back.

[ovidioj]

Hello folks,

I understand your frustration that the broadcast feature is back to using AI transcription instead of your human voice. I apologize for the inconvenience, especially since this issue seemed to have been resolved previously.

Thank you for letting us know, and you're right; several users have reported the same problem. This issue has already been escalated to our specialist team, who are actively investigating it.

We will keep you updated on any progress or potential solutions as soon as we have them.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Best regards,

Jorge. 

[Madshifter]

This problem is still intermittent. Sometimes it works, sometimes it's AI. 

It's basically unreliable. Please help resolve this problem @Muddi 

[g00glefanboy247]

Guys, i think it's back to normal again. Though I wonder how long it will last. Thanks for your responses. Hope yours are working as intended too.

[MplsCustomer]

It's back to normal for us too.

[kelanfromgoogle]

Hey folks,

I'm seeing your messages that this behavior is back to normal for you. I did check with the team and they've confirmed that a fix has been pushed. I apologize for the inconvenience, if you're still experiencing this issue with broadcasting after tomorrow please respond on this thread to let us know. 

Thank you,
Kelan

[g00glefanboy247]

hi, kelan. just to update the function is working but sometimes it will still use the assistant voice. it only happened a few times in a day. hope you can relay this to your team for further checking. thank you for your assistance. hope to hear from you soon.

[kelanfromgoogle]

Hey @g00glefanboy247 

I appreciate the heads up, I've let folks know that the behavior returned. I'll be back as soon as I hear more.

Thanks,
Kelan

[realjax]

Check with the team again. It was a half ss ed fix.

[OSTBear]

Still broken... I'd go so far as to say it was never fixed.

[OSTBear]

Found a workaround: if you add a bunch of gibberish noises to the front, it won't broadcast in robot voice.

[g00glefanboy247]

thank you for that insight. but i do hope they still fix it without us doing extra just to use an already working function messed up by updates.